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Cove pheasant tail.
Whoa! Must be high up on the list of all-time fish catchers. My first introduction to the technical world of buzzer fishing was with "The Cove", as we technical flyfishers call it. A good fly for April, a great fly for midsummer. If you pull this - yes I know it's a buzzer - if you pull this behind a muddler it helps sink your point fly, which can come in handy sometimes.
Now some serious talk: you need several sorts of buzzers. You need emergers, such as Shipman's for nailing fish in the surface, suspenders for those fish taking the pupa on the hang, wet flies for fishing the top few inches (yes I know wet flies aren't buzzers), seal fur buzzers for fishing just that little bit deeper, feather/floss types for fishing deeper still and glues for fishing deepest of all. I don't use leaded buzzers: I use a leaded point fly - if you're going to use lead you may as well go the whole hog and pack the stuff and you'll need a bigger fly for that.
It's also a good fly for side-sweeping in May (go back to the stillwater section if you don't know what side-sweeping is). White lure on the point, "The Cove" in the middle and a sedge pupa on the bob.
And I use it on rivers too; it's a great cased caddis pattern in New Zealand - hang it under a Suspender Royal Wulff and you're in business. Check out the tying...
Tying instructions:
Pheasant tail for the body, ribbed in the opposite direction with copper wire. Thorax of dubbed mole - I can't remember if the original is mole or rabbit underfur - both are pretty hot. A little tip for you: use brown thread - it's sexier. Oh and it's a size 10.
